A Somewhat Questionable Christmas Bedtime Story
by CyborgWithGreatHair
Summary: Tank, Lester and Bobby are on babysitting duty while Ranger and Steph are out for date night. Trying desperately to stick to the children's routine despite their hyped up states, the men initiate the bedtime story procedure. Unfortunately things don't quite go to plan. Rating for mentions of certain taboo topics (just to be safe). One Shot.


_While I was going through my unfinished Fanfic folder to find Catastrophic Consequences, I found this christmas themed songfic (based on "Fabian" By Australian comedy music trio Tripod) that I'd started a few years ago, but never completed. I think I probably got to the lyrics in the second verse and realised that the way I'd set it up wasn't exactly the best... but as I picked up where I left off, I managed to morph it and make it work. And so, here it is:_

**A Somewhat Questionable Christmas Bedtime Story**

"Twas the night before Christmas," Tank began in his gruff voice, arms crossed over his chest as he stared at the children sitting on the bed. They didn't appear the least bit tired, but everyone knew that bed time was seven o'clock on the dot. "And all through the house."

"We've heard that one, Uncle Tank," the older of the pair informed him with all the authority that came from being a eight year old version of both her parents. Then, just be sure that her point came across, she crossed her arms, mimicking her Uncle's posture, and added, "Twice." Amelia Louise Manaso, better known to all the Merry Men as Millie, definitely thought she was in charge. And most of the time she was probably right.

The men would do anything for her, including tea parties in the break room complete with tiaras and tutus, but tonight Tank, if not all three of the men who'd been tasked with babysitting, had had enough. He was pretty sure Steph had been feeding them sugar all day in preparation for their evening with the Uncles. He wouldn't put it past her, especially after the mud incident the last time they'd babysat.

"What story do you want, then?" Tank asked on a sigh as three year old Poppy crawled out from under the covers he'd just tucked around her and over onto his lap.

"Reindeer," Poppy said, sticking her hands on her head to imitate antlers.

"Yeah," Millie agreed. "We want a story about reindeer." She had that smirk on her face, the one she'd learned from her mother, so Tank knew she wasn't finished. There were always conditions. "But not about Rudolph," she added. "I'm sick of hearing about Rudolph."

At that moment Lester, who had been leaning against the wall beside the door with Bobby, stepped forward, settling himself on the edge of the bed. "I've got this one, Tank," he assured the man rubbing his hands together. "You Dasher, right?" he asked Millie. The little girl nodded. "And Dancer, Prancer, and Vixen?"

"Of course I do, Uncle Lester," Millie assured him, exasperated.

"What about Comet and Cupid?" Bobby asked from the door.

Poppy nodded enthusiastically and began attempting to sing Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer, but Lester cut her off.

"Do you know Chopper and Nixon?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

Millie gave him a dubious look, the kind she'd been known to give when they suggested oatmeal for breakfast instead of her customary Frosted Flakes. It was the kind of look that told the men that they knew they were wrong so stop kidding themselves. It's odd how an eight year old can have such a strong sense of confidence, but then again, she was Ranger's child. And Ranger had confidence in spades. It was only natural that his first born inherit such a trait along with Steph's unruly hair and big blue eyes.

"Chopper and Nixon aren't reindeer, Uncle Lester," she said.

"Says who?" Tank asked, unceremoniously dumping Poppy back into the bed and smoothing down her straight hair as he pulled the covers up for the second time that evening. "Just because they're not listed in the Ruldoph song doesn't mean there aren't others."

Bobby shook his head, pulling a beanbag chair out of the corner and settling himself into it. "Jeez," he commented, eyeing the children before sending a glance toward his comrades. "If they don't even know Chopper and Nixon, there's no way they're gonna know the _least_ famous reindeer of all."

"Who's that?" Poppy asked eagerly, bouncing a little on the bed.

"Fabian, of course," Lester pointed out, like it should be obvious. It couldn't have been, though, because the tale of Fabian the reindeer, which he was about to tell his two young nieces, was one that he would be making up on the spot. It would be funny, for sure, and he was confident he could edit out anything truly disturbing that might come to mind as he was spinning the yawn, Steph would kill him if he managed to give the pair nightmares from a Christmas story.

He cast a glance toward Tank and Bobby, much the way Bobby had a moment earlier, ensuring that they were all on the same page before he started. This would be a bedtime story to remember.

"Alrighty, then," Lester said, wiggling further onto the bed and nudging Poppy aside so he could lean against the headboard with them. "This is the tale of the reindeer that nobody knows," he explained, adjusting the duvet so that Poppy and Millie were both tucked securely underneath. "He was shoved down the back and largely ignored on account of a nasal disfigurement."

Millie's hand shot straight up in the air at that, as was her custom when she had a question, even when she was out of school. She thought it was respectful to not immediately interrupt with her queries.

"Yes, Millie?" Tank asked, stifling a weary sigh. He'd been ready to throw them in bed and close the door on them an hour ago, thanks to the antics that Lester had encouraged throughout the afternoon, but the girls needed Routine. Capital R. Send them to bed early and they'd be like the hounds of hell tomorrow. And since tomorrow was the big Rangeman Christmas lunch, no one wanted to invite the hell hounds out to play.

"What is a dis-fig-your-ment?" she asked, carefully sounding out the word to be sure she pronounced it correctly.

"A disfigurement," Bobby explained, leaning further back in his beanbag, "Is when something is not quite figured, or made, correctly. For example, if Uncle Tank had a head shaped like a football, that would be a disfigurement."

This earned the medic a glare, as Tank rose from the bed to lean against the wall. It was not the end of the questions, however, as Poppy then raised her hand, barely waiting for it to reach full extension before she blurted, "What's nasal?"

"You nose, munchkin," Lester said, tweaking hers and pretending to tuck the stolen facial feature in his pocket.

Millie frowned as she thought this over, her expression so similar to Steph's when she was joining the dots on an FTA file that there was no doubt in any of their minds that she was destined for greatness. If she was anywhere near as smart and intuitive as her parents, the world needed to start bracing itself now. In couple of years, she'd probably be killing it on the debate team. "So Fabian had a weird nose?"

"Pretty much," Lester confirmed. "Kinda like Rudolph in that sense. The hallmarks are almost the same, except instead of his nose being red and shiny like Rudolph's, Fabian had just a cavity."

Millie's hand was once again in the air, prompting another almost sighed acknowledgment from the big man by the door. "Cavity like in teeth?" she asked. "Did he have teeth in his nose?"

All three men let out a bark of laughter at that. Talk about connecting the dots! "No, no, no," Bobby said, having recovered more quickly that the others. "A cavity is like a hole. You can get cavities in your teeth, yes, but cavity we're talking about with Fabian is just a hole."

"No nose at all," Lester piped in. "Just a big ol' empty space in the middle of his face,"

"Just a couple of chambers," Bobby added, pulling his own nose up in the classic imitation of a pig's snout and causing the girls to giggle and bounce about on the bed.

Tank really did sigh, then. Giggling was not conducive of a successful bedtime routine. Giggling meant they were awake. Giggling meant that they were still hyped. Giggling was a dreadful thing to hear at ten minutes to seven in the evening, especially knowing that Ranger expected the girls to be fast asleep by the time they returned from dinner at eight o'clock. Tank got the feeling that no matter what they did from hear on out, they'd be dealing with demon children by tomorrow afternoon, and he knew exactly who would be to blame for that: Lester. But since Tank was technically in charge of operation batsitting…

"Now what you need to remember," Lester continued. "Is that abnormal snouts were surprising common in reindeer. Rudolph and Fabian, and a whole bunch of other reindeer all fell victim to the elves and their cost-cutting measures."

The girl's attention was solely on their Uncle Lester as he explained the somewhat complicated financial structure of the North Pole and the budget reviews of Santa's workshop. It was doing wonders for their sleepy eyes, blinking slower and slower, their breathing evening out. Tank was just about to rejoice that bedtime might be getting back on track, but then Bobby opened his fat trap.

"So in keeping their overheads down," he interrupted Lester's soliloquy, "The elves fed the reindeer on reindeer….. cookies." He hastily added the extra word when Tank speared him a hard glare. Now was not the time to introduce the girls to the topic of cannibalism. There appeared to be some mental rewrites happening for a second before he added. "And on top of that, the sleeping conditions of the reindeer were terrible! Probably, he nose _froze_ off when he was a kid."

"So Fabian had just a cavity," Tank said, ensuring that they steered well clear of the story line Bobby was about to lead them down.

"His hooter was lacking!" Lester agreed.

"Bugger all schnozz," Bobby added. "And all this because his dad was also…. Malnourished and couldn't care for his family."

Tank and Bobby locked eyes for a second, a tense conversation taking place in the silence as Millie waved her hand in the air with another question. After several moments passed, Bobby nodded and made a key-turn gesture in front of his lips to show that he was done contributing to the story now. It was probably for the best if he was going to veer off into taboo topics for the eight and three year-olds.

"Got a question, Mills?" Lester asked once Bobby and Tank had come to their agreement.

"Malnourished," she stated, a clear request for definition. Nothing got past that kid. If she didn't understand a word, she'd ask for clarification. Tank had made the mistake of laughing at her the first time it happened, but had been neatly informed that it was not funny and she needed to know what the word meant, otherwise she'd never learn.

"When you don't eat the right things so your body doesn't have all the nutrients it needs," Lester explained easily. "That's why Daddy and Mommy insist you eat your vegetables."

"You don't want to end up with a hole for a nose, do you?" Tank added, hoping to give some added incentive to eating their greens, because they definitely took after their mother in that respect. They would take a donut over a salad any day.

Having been left out of the conversation for far too long, and not entirely interested in the consequences of not eating her greens, Poppy crawled out from under the covers yet again, kneeling up to face Lester dead on and asked, "Does Fabian save Christmas like Rudolf?"

Lester gazed lovingly into his youngest nieces eyes, reached out and pulled her into a gently hug and replied simply. "No." He swept her back under the covers, pulling them right up to her chin and tucking them in tightly around her body so she could barely move and inch. "He was disliked by the other reindeer. Alone. He watched from afar as Rudolph lead the others back home. And you know why?"

"Why?" Poppy asked.

"Because he was a terrible reindeer," Lester said, an inch from her nose. "He was mean, and arrogant, and self-serving – wouldn't do anything for anyone else."

"An absolute face-hole," Bobby announced, breaking the vow he'd silently made to Tank and promptly hauling himself up out of the beanbag and out of the room when he realised what he'd done. He'd made a complete mess of bedtime and this story, and now he'd inserted a rude insult into it for the girls to repeat at a completely inopportune time. Probably in front of their parents. Probably, he should just book an appointment to meet Ranger and Tank on the mats for his punishment right now.

He made his way to the kitchen, grabbed a bottle of water, and sat at the island bench, waiting for the others to be finished putting the girls to bed. He was never going to live this one down, he just knew it.

Tank took over the story telling from there, explaining in a very long winded fashion about legal charges that were pressed against Fabian the day he caused a major fog all over the world by fiddling with the settings of a complicated weather machine. With his monotone voice and the dry material, Millie and Poppy were, thankfully, asleep within seven minutes, allowing Tank and Lester to transfer Poppy to her own bed, and slip out of the bedroom to go berate their friend for his slip ups.

When they entered the kitchen it was to find Bobby with his head resting on the bench, lightly snoring. This did not stop the razzing Lester had prepared on his way through the apartment, though. He nudged his partner's shoulder, catching him when he nearly fell off the bar stool as jolted awake. "What the hell was _that?_" Lester asked, grinning from ear to ear, a stark contrast from the dark expression that had descended over Tank's face.

"I didn't realise how exhausted I was until I settled into that beanbag," Bobby yawned. "I was up at the hospital half the night with Cravis after his accident, and I didn't manage to squeeze a nap in today. I guess it just hit me. And you know how my filter goes when I don't get enough sleep."

Lester nodded his understanding, but Tank was still simmering. "The elves fed the reindeer on reindeer?" he demanded. "They're eight and three! They don't need to know about cannibalism yet! Hell, they don't need to know about cannibalism _anytime_ in my opinion."

Bobby scrubbed his hands over his face. "Just be thankful I didn't say what else I had lined up," he said forlornly. "Inbred reindeer. His dad was also going to be his sister. Whom he then ate."

"What the actual fuck?" Lester breathed reverently. "That's fucked up."

"Yes, well, you better hope that they forget all about your face-hole comment," Tank pointed out. "Or you'll be needing to put those medic skills of yours to work on yourself after the beating Ranger delivers."

"Who's beating am I delivering now?" Ranger asked, appearing in the doorway to the kitchen with Stephanie a step behind.

"Nothing to worry about, boss," Lester assured him. "Tonight's bedtime story just had a somewhat questionable sub plot. Not to worry, though, we did some smooth cover up, so I don't think there'll be any adverse effects."

Bobby sent his friend a grateful face, chugging the rest of his water and standing to leave. "We'll leave you kids to enjoy the rest of your evening," he said on another yawn, slapping Ranger on the back and allowing Steph to deliver a one armed hug as he passed through to the entrance way, Tank and Lester on his heels. He needed to get out of the apartment and into bed before he stuck his foot any further into his own mouth.

The men shared a very quiet ride down to the fourth floor where they divide ways and escaped into their individual apartments. Tank still mulling over the potential consequences for himself if something Bobby said turned up in Millie and Poppy's vocabulary, Lester chuckling to himself over how devastatingly terrible Bobby's decisions had been, surpassing even his own record, and Bobby kicking himself for not bowing out of tonight's babysitting gig in favour of getting in some of the winks he'd missed the previous night. He just knew it was all going to come back to bit him on the ass.

And bite him in the ass it did.

Three days later, Bobby was changing Cravis's dressing in his medical suite on the third floor when the door flew open to admit one livid Ranger. "You have ten minutes to meet me on the mats, face-hole," he commanded, and stalked off back down the hallway, leaving Bobby to finish securing the bandage around Cravis's thigh while attempting to ignore the laughter hearing the unconventional insult had prompted in his patient.

"Better call Lester and have him on standby to drive me to the ER," Bobby said to Cravis as he snapped off his gloves and tossed them in the medical waste bin. "This isn't going to be pretty."

* * *

**_Merry Christmas, everyone! I hope yours goes at least a little better than Bobby's did..._**


End file.
